Alan Bock's Blog, Writer for the Orange County Register, and author of Waiting to Inhale, and Ambush at Ruby Ridge

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Death in Vienna

One can never know for sure what goes into a decision to commit suicide, and there is still much too little known about the circumstances surrounding Freddie Mac chief financial officer David Kellerman’s suicide in the Washington suburb of Vienna, VA for me even to speculate. It does seem that he was under heavy pressure at work as CFO of a quasi-company-quasi-government-agency that lost $50 billion last year. I’ll just link to this WaPo story and this NYT story that offer a few more details than I’ve seen on various TV reports.

I'm not sure why seeing Kellerman's house on cable news struck me so hard, except that when I lived in the capital area, in Falls, Church, next door to Vienna, I spent a fair amount of time in Vienna, shopping, going to a particular bar, concerts at Wolf Trap, etc. I'm sure I drove through that neighborhood numerous times -- way above my price range then or now, but nice to look at.

It also reminded me that I can always say that I played in the pit orchestra for performances of a Franz Lehar operetta done by the Civic Light Opera Company of Vienna -- Vienna, Virginia, that is. Since I left there in 1980 to come home to California and the Register, it had to be 1978 or 1979. They recruited wind players from a community band I was playing in, and since I was the only bassoonist who showed an interst, I was in. The operetta was "Land of Smiles," and actually the music was pretty easy.